He ate what???

Food. OMG! I love food. I love the sweet, the savory, the sour (sometimes), and even the spicy (in small doses). Mostly, I love the sweet.

The sweets have been one of my challenges for most of my life. Everybody knows how bad they are for the human body, but I just couldn’t stop. Oh, I’d go on a diet for a while, and I’d lose some weight– never enough– but then it would be somebody’s birthday, or a holiday (I didn’t care which one), and I’d start devouring again.

My relationship with food has been complicated. I don’t really care for most of the veggies you find in a Typical American Salad, so I sort of stopped eating vegetables for a while. And you’re supposed to eat more fruit than veggies, so I gave up on those, too.

Obviously, my eating habits had to go through a complete overhaul once I discovered I have Celiac’s Disease. No more using a pastry for breakfast, unless I want to make it myself first. No more bread, unless I want toast (because OMG! Have you tasted commercial GF bread? It’s awful if it’s not toasted!) Certainly no more visits to Tony’s Italian Deli for a heavenly roast beef sammich with a side of macaroni salad.

You would think with so many carbs no longer available to me, I must have become some health nut: Fruits! Veggies! Lean meats! Oh, my! But the thing is, there are alternatives. I can get pretty much everything I enjoy made with rice (or corn or potato or tapioca) instead of wheat. It just takes more effort, and it’s less likely to be found at the corner convenience store. So really, a gluten free diet can still be very carb friendly.

A couple years ago I came home from work sick as a dog. I couldn’t keep anything down. Not even chicken soup. Finally, in desperation, I tried celery sticks, and ended up not only keeping them down but craving any vegetable I could get my hands on. I even started craving cucumbers, of all things. Cucumbers. *shudders* (I’ve even been able to eat them ever since. Whodda thunkit?)

One of the things I’ve learned from that experience, is if I’m thinking I should be eating more veggies, because I haven’t had enough today, but I really don’t want any more veggies because I’m craving sweet, I go with fruit. I still get fiber and I get sweet. And it’s a helluva lot better for me than something in a wrapper. Or so I thought.

Have you heard about the nutrition professor who went on the Twinky diet? I know, it sounds like a set up to a joke, but it isn’t. (Find the original CNN article here.) To make a point with his class, he went on the Twinky Diet for a month. And lost weight. And balanced all his cholesterol levels in a good way. Like, he’s kind of baffled because he got exactly the opposite result from what modern science tells you, and he doesn’t know what to make of it.

And what does that tell me? THAT WE ARE ALL DIFFERENT. Our bodies are different. Any child can tell that just from looking around. Have you noticed how some people can eat anything and never gain weight? How some people exist on salads alone and can’t seem to lose it? Doesn’t anybody think there might be something else going on here? Maybe it’s more than calories in vs calories out?

Does that mean my veggie-free diet is the way to go? Well, for me, no. I’m thinking for my body, yes, veggies are required. But I refuse to speak for yours.

And in honor of celebrating every body’s individual needs, I present Miri’s GF Cinnamon Spiced Chocochip Cookies. It makes a pretty decent load of cookies, so if you’re single or just a two-some, you can freeze the pre-baked balls of dough and save some for later. Toaster ovens are great for this.

Yield: a lot of cookies, depending on your definition of a teaspoonful.

This is my favorite cookie recipe ever. The cinnamon adds a new dimension to an old-timey favorite. You can also experiment with ginger, cloves, and/or allspice. And NO. You do not need any gums or anything as binders. They hold their shape just fine.

Heh. I’m not sure any will be left by this weekend and OMG!! early. But I can make some again soonish. And you can have some if you come over before I eat them all. ;D OR if you come over WHEN I MAKE THEM, that would work too.